My birthday is Halloween Eve. I turned 23 this year. It's the first year I've had a birthday where the number really wasn't all that exciting.

Since we were kids, all of our birthdays meant something. You were officially a preteen, a teenager, one year closer to 16 or 18. Then you get to turn 20 where you aren't a teenager at all anymore, then you are on the countdown until you're 21. Then you get a whole year where anyone can play Taylor Swift's "22" and you can sing it at the top of your lungs because finally, there's a song just for you.

Then there's 23. I don't know about you, but I'm not feeling 22 and I'm also not feeling 23. I'm feeling more like, where did time go? I was just 18 like literally yesterday. I was a freshman in college where then night began at 11:00. Now I'm 23 and I'm too tired to even watch a full movie if we start it after 10:00.

I was NOT excited about 23. I didn't know what to look forward to. But boy, God always proves me wrong.

We don't need something to look forward to actually be happy. We have to start living for what is right in front of us, not what might be in front of us in a couple of months, weeks or years. But what is right here and right now.

My friend group has gotten smaller as I've grown up. But it's the best friend group I've ever had. People spent their entire Friday night celebrating me and making me feel loved and appreciated. Then on my actual birthday, people went out of their way to do it all over again.

I got caught up in the idea that I didn't have a "monumental birthday" anymore and I almost looked over the best parts of a birthday anyway.

I was so blessed and so happy and so full of good and happy moments from the weekend of celebrating that by the time my actual birthday rolled around, the tears were just overflowing. I never once even thought about the fact that 23 doesn't count for anything by normal standards.

But it does, it counts for everything because I got another year. I found out on my birthday that a college classmate of mine had passed away over the weekend. The same weekend I was celebrating my life, a family was mourning the loss of another one.

It's not the milestones that count for anything. It's all the moments and joy and happiness in between. I've been 23 for less than a week. But it's already taught me so much.

Hold your friends tighter and closer. Love without condition and without reserve. Talk to people you see often, even if you think you might come off as weird, just do it. Don't wait for "momentous milestones" to be happy and to enjoy. Do that every day. Every day is a gift.

We should and treat it as such. Celebrate every day, every birthday, every little thing that comes along. It is so worth it.